


Carousel

by GarishGarchomp



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Gold & Silver & Crystal | Pokemon Gold Silver Crystal Versions
Genre: Anxiety, Gen, pretty skies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-24
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2019-07-04 00:16:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 15,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15829860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GarishGarchomp/pseuds/GarishGarchomp
Summary: "Amongst all these foreign sensations, it's this feeling he never wants to forget. The feeling that he's defying reality in the most elegant way."A young man's path for actualization, whether he believes in it or not.





	1. Blue Blood

**Author's Note:**

> This story is part of the LLF Comment Project, which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates feedback, including:
> 
> Feedback
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>   * Short comments
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> 
> This author replies to comments.
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> If you'd prefer not to receive a reply from me, just sign your comment with "whisper" and I will still love you forever, but silently.

When the voice clears its throat, it freezes him in his tracks and ices over his mind. The sky erupts, waves of orchid melding with turquoise before the stars. The horizon expands before him, greedily swallowing the trees and spitting out a sea instead. 

The wind takes a left-turn, blowing straight in his face now. It’s strong enough to wake him from his trance.

“Gorgeous, hm?” she asks, receiving a dumbfounded nod in return. His toes curl, and end up tilling sand. Only then does he realize he’s barefoot, though the rest of his flashy attire remains. He silently thanks nobody in particular that he isn’t naked in the presence of divinity. 

He also desperately hopes said divinity didn’t hear that thanks.

“Yes,” Eusine replies, looking out over the infinite sea. It glistens beneath the glow of the borealis illuminating the scene. The water is eerily placid, a calm that seeps so deeply into his bones that all he can say leaves his mouth in a whisper. It feels oddly right to him, though. To be so taken aback, yet too paralyzed to show it. 

When he blinks and the legend herself appears before him, though, not even the weight she holds keeps him from jolting. He knows she must hear how his breath is stolen away.

Suicune bows her head, beckoning him closer as her crystalline crest reflects the lights above. There are few creatures that hold hypnotic powers, and even fewer that do so out of sheer poise. Yet, Eusine gets the feeling that when she gives a suggestion, it’s taken to the deepest chambers of the heart. That when she gives a command, there's never a question as to whether it will be carried out.

He knows that because he’s walking on water without a second thought just to do as she gestured, not even as she said. Once again he thanks the gods, this time because he hasn’t met a woman with this kind of pull over him.

Suicune regards Eusine as much as he regards her, albeit with very different motives. She reads his soul just by a glance at his finger, while he can’t decide which part of her to be awed at the most. The flawless fuchsia mane that flows effortlessly catches his eye first, making his own hair feel worse than inadequate. The ribbons that glide alongside her, those too he finds easy to get lost in. He doesn’t dare touch her sleek blue coat, while the crystal atop her head is half of what drew him over in the first place, which just leaves one last striking detail. Those deep red eyes, always stern yet equally assured. He feels a certain serenity in them, even as she seems to take this opportunity to pry into his soul. 

No matter how hard Eusine tries, he can’t tear himself away from them.

“You have a mountain ahead, Eusine,” she tells him, with a smoky voice obscuring the hint of an accent he can’t quite place. 

“Do I?” he asks. A voice in the back of his head berates him for such a stupid reply, though he hardly listens to it. All humans probably sound like that to her. At least he hopes so.

“If you’re to dart upon the seas, you’ve to tromp through Johto first. And if you’re to be elevated, you must grow to those heights first.”

Eusine slowly nods. He’s been read the tales a hundred times and read them for himself another hundred. He’s committed the mythos to memory like everyone else. Yet, he still finds it impossible to believe he’s here. 

It would be enough to make him shakier than ever, if he wasn’t absolutely transfixed. He feels as though his mind should be racing, yet it’s merely strolling in place in front of the god. Eusine briefly wonders if Suicune ever feels that way, or if she’s as calm as all the hyperbole would have him believe. Calm enough that her mind never comes close to budging, even when the stakes are stratospheric.

He finally tears himself away by looking out across the endless waters upon which he stands by the grace of a god. If nothing else, amongst all these foreign sensations, it’s this feeling he never wants to forget. The feeling that he’s defying reality in the most elegant way.

Suicune catches him getting lost at sea. “When the time comes, your little realm may be as close to this as feels right, or entirely dissimilar. Though I get the sense this ocean may already be where your heart lies.”

Eusine glances at her, unable to suppress a smile.It’s enough to make him wonder why she’s chosen him, if the way he’s going about it is all dumb smiles and shell-shock. 

“That emotion here that’s so foreign to you right now, that aura you sense, however cognizant you are of it? Take heed of it, as that energy will be there in your realm. That energy must be there, because it will be your essence.”

He swears Suicune gives the smallest self-contained laugh in the world. He didn’t even know Suicune could laugh. It didn’t seem in her character. 

“Should you make it to that point, that is.”

She turns now, gazing upon the sea of her own creation before turning to the skies above and belting out a howl for the ages. That roar sends everything alight. The sea grows choppy, almost stormy, before dissipating. The sky rattles unsteadily before finally shambling and shattering. The stars left in its wake are mere shards of the northern lights, while the trees that bloom from nowhere aspire to pluck those sparkling fragments right out of Arceus’ orchard. 

Even as Suicune’s realm makes way for old Johto, he hears her give one last word.

“Seek the sea guardian’s scion, and the path shall illuminate from there. Exaltation awaits, Eusine.”

Until now, Eusine only had fleeting wonders of what it feels like to carry along a god’s presence. As he makes way for Violet City, though, he feels completely, peculiarly buoyed. 

Perhaps the puddles left in each footstep behind him have something to do with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've always wanted to do more with Eusine. Like, in the canon he's spent so much of his life pursuing Suicune, but to what end? Just to see it up close? And just because he was told stories about the 'cune as a kid? I've seen variations of it depending on the media, but it's about time I contributed something myself. Write the story you want to read and all, y'know. Somehow "connect Eusine and Suicune in a different way" turned into me confronting my own writing style to an extent I'd never done before, and this is the result. 
> 
> The chapter title (bc to the uninitiated here on AO3 (hello from the Nuzlocke forums), I'm a MASSIVE music ho and name everything after music) is "Blue Blood" by Foals, who have been fantastic writing music for this run in their own right, but lemme also note the run title. Carousel, by East India Youth. I had been struggling for a name for a couple days, but as soon as I rediscovered this gem, I knew I'd found the one. Something in the soundscape, in the aesthetic, just struck me big-time as befitting this run. Both of his albums, really, are perfect listening material for me as I write this run. 
> 
> Anyways, that's enough rambling. Thanks for stopping by and taking a gander! I'm super excited to be writing this and sharing it with you all, and I'm just as excited to have you along for the ride.


	2. Gates of Dawn

As if Sprout Tower is toying with fate, there are candles lit all about the first floor. It provides not only ambience, but an undercurrent of danger given the entire tower is made solely of wood. Eusine was already fidgety walking around town; Violet City was practically just a smaller Ecruteak, which meant everywhere he wandered carried a reminder of how far he had yet to go. The curved roofs are still shedding that morning’s rain, and even from inside the tower, he can hear and feel how damp it is. As if he isn’t weighed down enough.

The monks on the ground floor regard him with stoic nods before extinguishing each candle. The various wisps of smoke and their too-familiar scent bring Eusine to a halt. The tower combusts before him, with the smell of smog first to hit him. Flames climb the walls and leap at his sides as he approaches the stairs. His lungs seize as he tries to reach the stairs, his breath already failing him like like Suicune’s did so many centuries ago, before she was a deity.

He squeezes his eyes shut, rubbing his arms free of phantom flames, and when he looks again, Sprout Tower is back, as unscathed as ever. The last remnants of smoke dissipate in the humid air as he rights himself. With a deep exhale, he proceeds upward.

He’s greeted on the third floor by a face much fresher than his own pale visage. When Falkner sees him, though, he lights up with a pearly smile.

“Eusine, welcome!” The way Lugia’s conduit glides across the room to extend his hand is enough to make Eusine stiffen. _He represents the god of_ storms _, damn it, yet he can’t be more relaxed if he tried…_

Eusine tries to keep a firm handshake, but it melts under Falkner’s vice-grip. 

“I’ve got a fantastic feeling about this,” Falkner continues, unruffled by the exalt-hopeful’s silence. “And I can’t say that to everyone, or Lugia would have my hide.”

A creaky smile labors its way onto Eusine’s face as he swallows and clears his throat quietly. “Well, I’m glad you chose to tell me.” 

Falkner’s warm gaze flickers, quick enough that Eusine nearly misses it.

There’s only one lantern on each wall for lighting, and he keeps finding himself drawn into the glint of the bulb behind him, reflected in Falkner’s cobalt eyes. As if he didn’t already look so much livelier.

“I don’t choose when I say it,” is all he says in return. He motions behind him, to two modest cushions behind the main pillar holding Sprout Tower steady. They look as though they were taken off the street from a garish cyan sofa. 

Eusine adjusts his cape as he sits down, trying his best to get his mind steady and his heart rate down. The time Falkner takes to waltz over, luxuriously stretch his limbs, and give him a conspiratorial wink just means more time for his blood to pump far too quickly.

He gives the tiniest of nods before squeezing his eyes shut, blocking out everything but his own breath. It doesn’t always help, to leave himself alone in a place where his thoughts could take full control. Somehow, though, he feels as eased as he can be. He can’t tell if it’s resignation or if there’s something about Falkner being there that helps.

Just as he starts to rein himself in from the stratosphere, “Ready when you are,” comes from across the seating area. Any peace he’d carved out for himself shatters like crystals hurled against the wall.

Eusine opens his eyes. Falkner’s are glowing, eager embers just waiting to hurl themselves on a flame. With a sigh, he takes a moment to right himself. “Ready as I can be.”

That blue glow spreads from his eyes, dripping upwards before hardening around them. Not into skin, but scales, royal blue scales that only intensify his gaze. His palms rise from his lap, both pointing towards the ceiling, and the further they rise, the more the wind crescendos. First a breeze, then a gust, then a smirk. “Hold on to… anything.”

Then a gale. 

Even though it arrives at the peak of a steady climb, it nearly knocks Eusine on his side at its climax. It deafens him to all but his own thoughts, and those are hard enough to rein in at zero miles per hour, much less a hundred.

He manages a glance at Falkner. With Lugia’s glimmering eyes, he sits unperturbed in the center of it all. His shaggy hair covers half his face, his robes look like they want to escape his body, but he sits perfectly still, and perfectly, agonizingly straight. It’s not that he’s unaware of the wind. It’s that he feels comfortable in it. With the tower swaying and Eusine cowering, Falkner just gives the same faint smirk as his master passes judgment.

Judgment. The reason he’s here. He wasn’t brought here to flail about for a god’s amusement, though he wouldn’t doubt it being a benefit. But with his hands glued to the floor and his back curled, those thoughts of humiliation and failure fight through the wind to settle in again. He’s already blown it, he thinks. He was in over his head when Suicune summoned him, and it’s all blowing over him now. What exalt of Suicune shrinks like this under the wind?

“Rise, Eusine,” he’s instructed, by two voices at once. Falkner’s friendly lilt melds with Lugia’s booming monotone and the shrieking gales in the worst way, but it serves its purpose. It startles Eusine to as rapt attention as he can give.

“S-stand…?” he asks. He’s not the only one trembling under a god’s might. Sprout Tower is lurching, the pillar straining to uphold centuries of trials like this. The four lights shudder, and he follows suit. 

“Yes, stand,” comes the reply, almost as a laugh, almost lost to the howls pummeling Eusine. 

Those howls bring him back to the invocation. To Suicune, goddess of composure, bellowing out a single note that sent everything into sparks. With minimal effort, she could illuminate the skies in ways that would overwhelm every artist in Johto, or turn a pool of muck into water clear enough to peer inside one’s own soul. She could conceive a place more tranquil than any other being could dare to imagine… and she had dragged Eusine, of all people, into it.

He swears he feels her guiding him. He feels her composure, the same composure she wants out of him now. The balance to rise, the poise to stay upright amidst the storm, and the faith that he can do it. And more than all that, he feels her trust in him to do it, if he can find the strength. If he can find the stability. 

If he can find the peace.

He looks at Falkner again. Still motionless. The lights stutter again, warm and cold, on and off, copper and cobalt, and this time Eusine grits his teeth and stays still rather than follow their lead. The gale continues its onslaught, yet it’s not as oppressive. His hands swim in his vision as he finds his balance.

And then he pushes off.

He stumbles backwards, nearly slipping on the cushion, before planting his weight as hard as he can. The floor trembles and shifts underfoot, wanting so badly to give out and let the wind win. Eusine holds his ground though, loosening up with each breath, grasping at whatever peace he might reach and taking every scrap he can get his teeth on. 

Before he can comprehend it all, he’s standing straight before a beaming Falkner. By the time he does, he realizes Falkner is sitting on air. 

“Excellent work, Eusine. It all began with doubt and fear, and now look at you.”

Eusine glances down at himself, his clothes stirring wildly in the wind while his bowtie clings on for dear life. 

“You’re level in the middle of a cyclone, my friend. Only those with the potential for exalthood can keep the storm from battering them into submission… when I craft it as such, of course.” This time, it is Lugia who smiles. Somehow, Eusine manages to match it.

The winds die down, notch by notch, until stillness is restored. After what just transpired, the serenity almost feels tense. Only the hint of dripping water outside lets Eusine preserve the tranquility he’s so carefully built up now. When Falkner’s feet touch the ground again, as elegantly as Suicune trods upon water, Eusine is still trying to commit this feeling to memory. He cannot take any peace he attains for granted, not at this point.

“You’re free to move on,” Falkner says, striding forward for another handshake. It’s the prospect of being crushed in his talons that finally wrests the near-eerie calm from Eusine’s grip, but he smiles all the same. 

Falkner brandishes a comb with his free hand and offers it up. Eusine nods in thanks, eagerly taking it to do what he can to right his hair again. There are no mirrors, but he’s groomed it so often that the routine’s well-worn into muscle memory. Falkner stands before him, waiting, clasping and unclasping his hands before finally relenting and straightening Eusine’s attire. They pause for a second as their eyes lock, both taking in the unfamiliar spark of the other’s, before finishing up their business.

“Appreciate it,” Eusine says, handing the comb back after that pause.

“Of course! A word of advice, though, before you depart.”

Even though Falkner’s gaze is less than stern, Eusine falters. He had to have seen something wrong there, he thinks. Some fatal flaw that will keep him from reaching the end. And found so soon, too…

“Uh… go ahead?” he stammers.

Falkner rests a hand on his counterpart’s shoulder, keeping up the same smile he’s worn almost the entire time. Somehow, unlike most, his touch loosens him up rather than tightens him, comforts rather than invades. It’s enough to make Eusine lean a little bit closer, and for him to put a little more stock in what’s about to come out.

“Have faith,” Falkner says. “Not in the gods, as you have plenty of that already. Have faith in yourself as well. Even just clinging to a shred of faith in the midst of a hurricane can see you through to the other side. You’re plenty strong enough for that.”

Eusine stares, and stares, and finally nods. Easier said than done, especially in the moment, but… if today is anything to go by, it’s surely possible.

“Swing by if you need anything else, or if you just need a break,” Falkner says, pulling back now. He spares him another handshake, settling for a wave. Eusine smiles, waving back for a beat too long before taking his leave.

Before he departs town, he stops to take in the sight of Sprout Tower under the impending sunset. From where he stands it looks like nothing happened in there, that there was no hurricane, no test to speak of. Amidst a trial from a god, it swayed and shook but never came close to breaking. 

Before he goes to sleep that night, Eusine says a prayer asking for that same brand of strength.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm prolly just gonna use A/Ns here for chapter title music refs.
> 
> Chapter song is "Gates of Dawn" by Heartless Bastards, who I promise aren't some hardcore punk band. I didn't have any good storm songs on my playlist, and I liked this anyways as Falkner is essentially that first gatekeeper for Eusine on his quest, so, ye.


	3. Gentle Storm

It’s not that the path all the way down to Azalea was crowded by anyone’s definition of the word. When Eusine ducks into the forests even further south, following Suicune’s call to the Cape of Convergence, though, he feels some comfort in the fact that he’s sure to be completely alone.

The exception is a young Drowzee, toddling alongside him when she isn’t distracted by another creature to antagonize. While Laguna is far too roguish for her own good, Eusine appreciates what she brings to his modest team, not to mention someone who can actually converse with him.

Laguna tugs on his arm, pointing to an especially agitated snake floating several feet in the air. _“Look! This one’s reeeeally angry with me~”_

He wasn’t always appreciative of the conversation, however. After rubbing his eyes and making her hypnotize the Ekans before it lashes out, Eusine drags her away, trying to keep her from causing any undue mayhem before he reaches his destination.

As the thick woods finally relinquish control of the landscape to the rugged end of Johto, he finds himself wishing more people knew of the beauty tucked away here on the southern edge. They should for all intents and purposes stay away, so as not to ruin a view uncorrupted by mankind, but if everyone knew just what kind of majesty their humble little region kept as a secret, he believed they would be that much prouder to call it home.

The rocks below, scorched by Ho-oh’s flames centuries ago, take a beating from Lugia’s tides, at least pushing back against their fate. Eusine can only peer down at them for a few seconds before the stark height gets to him, sending him staggering back before he does something stupid.

It’s that thought that clings to him yet again as he tries to get lost in the horizon. Before he does something stupid. Before he does something stupid, before he fucks it all up again, before he gets in his own way in yet another extraordinarily disappointing fashion.

He whips around when he hears humming and footsteps. Laguna’s peeling off the other way, likely to go find the beach. If she liked the beach any more, he thinks, she’d be a Kingler.

“Don’t go too far, okay? We shouldn’t be here too long,” he reminds her, trying to take this distraction as a chance to creep closer to the cliff’s edge.

_“Fiiiine, but next time we get to a beach, I’m staying as long as I want,”_ she pouts, even throwing in an eye-roll for good measure.

The swirling breezes pick up as Eusine turns his attention back south. The waters look subdued this time of day, encroaching on the land beneath him like it’s a chore. He takes in the salty scent gratefully; while his childhood was spent by the water, it was merely an inlet jabbing into Kanto’s side, and he hasn’t been able to make it out to the edges of Johto as often as he’d like.

And now here he is, more on-edge than ever.

He has to work himself into _standing_ here on the tip of Johto. The crosswinds, from Whirl Bay and Yoshino Inlet and the vast ocean, all seem to meet here in a conspiracy to send goosebumps up his arms. When he glances down at the convergence of Ho-oh’s and Lugia’s domains, he doesn’t see the ebb and flow of nature, of the gods themselves in an accord. He just sees that it’s happening far, far below him, far enough that one slip could end this journey of his even quicker than it began.

Suicune picked him, of all people. That’s what Eusine keeps coming back to. Suicune picked the man who just nearly scared himself off a cliff. The man who had to be told by Lugia’s proxy to believe in himself. The man who constantly feels like a shrub in a tornado is supposed to become an exalt for the paragon of poise. It sounds less like his destiny and more like the beginning of a joke.

As the worries whirl around him, so too do the flurries trying to shove him one direction, then another, then a third. Like the different bodies of water are wrestling over which one wants to claim his life, or perhaps they want to frame the other for his passing and avoid the resulting wrath of the gods.

Eusine feels weightless, feet planted on air as his breaths come out ragged. He can’t move, can’t bear to look down at himself, can’t bring himself to peer over the edge yet again lest his potential demise play out before him again. All he can do is stare across the sea, watching the waves file into shore one by one.

“Steady…”

It’s not his voice that says it.

It comes from his mouth, sure, but it’s not his voice. It could be the still-swarming winds that warp it, he thinks. Or he could be having enough of a panic attack that his senses are failing him. The sky that has him so paralyzed seems to be juddering, flashing fuchsia, falling apart in front of him. He can’t feel the ground anymore, and can’t glance down to check. The sea’s scent has faded, at least until he forces a whiff and takes in that fragrance that isn’t even comforting anymore. He wouldn’t doubt that his hearing is also forfeit by this point as well.

And yet, that weightlessness takes just as much off his shoulders as it does from beneath him. The winds seem to cool down and align themselves more and more, and his careening thoughts follow suit. Both of them point southward, where he’s already transfixed.

“Just stay steady…”

Eusine feels his hands unclench, and the wind caressing his fingers puts them even more at ease, even with the voice. The sky’s glitches seem to fade as well, but clouds now accumulate out at sea to block out his perfect horizon. He blinks, and those clouds start looking awfully grey. Another blink, and it’s raining over the ocean. Another blink, and every doubt that plagued him before is drowned out by the constant breeze blowing out towards the brine.

_“Eusine!”_

And reality crashes down on him like a breaker.

How long has he been here? When did the winds stop blowing every which way like usual? Why is he still so weightless?

He looks down, and that last question answers itself when he finds nothing but the ocean below his feet. He’s inches up and a couple feet off the cliff, but it’s enough to skip a heartbeat or two before he catches himself.

Eusine turns around to see Laguna jogging up, eyes wider than they’ve ever been.

“You’re… not doing this, are you?” he asks her, getting a quick shake of the head in return.

_“No. I mean, I wish…”_ she says, as mesmerized as he was just a moment earlier. _“How the hell’re you doing that?”_

He opens his mouth to say he doesn’t know, but only a half-formed “I…” comes out. Instead, he swears he hears the answer in the breeze, now blowing in his face. It’s delivered in a hiss, over and over and louder each time until it’s the only thing echoing in his head.

When he finally finds the headspace to comprehend it, Eusine cracks a smile borne from pride, from newfound wisdom, and more than a hint of relief.

“It’s the north wind,” he answers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note: this story does have the Nuzlocke tag, but the structure is going to be a bit unconventional. Not every gym leader is gonna make an appearance, though there's still a decent semblance of the game's path. With a story this short, though, I wanted to make sure every chapter served one of the specific purposes I'd laid out from the get-go and it just ended up impossible to shoehorn every gym leader in there. 
> 
> The chapter title is "Gentle Storm" by Elbow. They're another band that just fits the vibe of this run to a T, with a full discography of the kind of sweeping rock that could soundtrack an entire lifetime. Also, no, not every chapter is going to be windy as fuck. I promise.


	4. On The Water

It wasn’t enough to float above the ocean days earlier. By the time Eusine reaches Goldenrod City, the call of the sea reels him closer and closer, until he finds himself on a ferry across the bay. He swears it’s Lugia’s doing too, whether it’s an official summons or Falkner getting bored.  
  
The ferry out of Goldenrod is lengthy enough that most duck inside once the harbor is reduced to a blemish on the horizon. Only a few hyperactive kids remain on the deck while Eusine leans on the railing, but a couple drops of rain send them scurrying for cover. Eusine just puts on his old blue windbreaker and flips the hood up. If nothing else connected him to Suicune, at least he always reveled in the cleansing power of the rain.   
  
He gently ushers one lingering child inside as the storms of the Whirl Islands appear now to the south. Eusine stays out on the deck for the whole trip, though, hands glued to the rails and eyes glazed over, fixating on the south seas. It’s only once the ferry pulls into Cianwood that he thinks it felt too smooth, that there’s no way the novice captain had them within viewing distance of the Whirl outskirts and the ferry didn’t feel the effects.   
  
Then again, maybe he should have learned by now not to doubt any water-based affairs.  
  
Suicune’s emissary awaits him across the port, with a far more modest vessel. Eusine can only tell he’s the emissary by his boat’s purple sail stirring in the sea current, as the envoy himself seems… not of her ilk.  
  
“Eusine, are ya?” he asks, sticking out a hand. Despite the painful flashback to Falkner’s greeting, he accepts it, and his joints pay the price. “Name’s Chuck. I’ll be takin’ ya riiight back out there, so I hope you didn’t get seasick on the way over!”  
  
Chuck’s voice projects across the harbor with ease, as does his grin. It’s enough to make Eusine consider Suicune’s sense of humor, appointing such a boisterous man to represent her. And appointing such a fretful man to chase her.  
  
“Out where, might I ask?” Eusine asks, idly stretching his hands and cracking his knuckles.  
  
Chuck beams in a way that’s never a good sign. “Whirl Islands, my friend! Or as close as I can get ya to ‘em!”  
  
Eusine feels seasick thinking about it. Only two people venture out that way: the most powerful trainers in Johto, and sailors with death wishes. He can’t speak for Chuck, but he knows his own capacities as a trainer aren’t quite elite.  
  
Before he can delve down another rabbit hole of doubts, he’s snapped back to Cianwood with a clap on the shoulder. “Boy, you’re Suicune’s kid. You’re gonna be all right. Let’s get goin’ before we lose too much time.”  
  
He’s right. They’re all right. Chuck, Falkner, Suicune herself if she’s watching. He’s in good hands, and judging by the breeze that’s been stalking him across the bay, he’s already started building on his potential. So maybe, whatever awaits him out in Whirl Bay will be just another rung on the ladder.  
  
—————————  
  
“There’s no way.”  
  
The boat’s rocking enough to unsettle Chuck. Only a sliver of blue remains in the sky, back west in safety. Something short of a torrent pummels them, with the real storm up ahead. Worse yet, Chuck told Eusine not to wear his jacket or shoes, meaning he’s soaked and his hair is going to be hell to make presentable again. Apparently it’s something about “feeling the storm” and “becoming one with the water.” Cryptic hints that do nothing to ease his somersaulting stomach.  
  
The brawny sailor claps him on the back, more to shove him towards the edge of the boat than to support him. “Son, if there wasn’t a way then I’d be at the gym right now.”  
  
Eusine fights through shudders to give a nod, then takes one more step. Any further, and he’ll either be fighting the waves or riding them. He brushes his bangs out of his eyes before shutting them, blocking out everything but the wind he knows so well and the water he prays he’ll get to know next.  
  
He pictures Suicune, from what feels like a lifetime ago. The way the sea rippled beneath her paws, bending physics to her whim. The way she stood on water as easily as napping on grass. And the way he approached her, so mindlessly in his own right, as if portending this day. It was possible then, so it’s surely possible now.  
  
Eusine opens his eyes, looks at the choppy waters beneath him, and decides it can’t be.   
  
“Take the step, my son.”  
  
It’s her. The voice rattles around his head, the eye in this storm. It holds him in place, when all he wanted to do was bolt. It’s not the gentle command that sets him straight, though.   
  
“Son…?” he repeats, almost swallowed by the storm. She said it with such care and conviction that he nearly forgets his own mother.   
  
“Yes, Eusine,” she says. He swears he can hear her smile, though it’s hard to picture. “My exalt is my son, and I’ve full faith in you to achieve that. But it requires this step.”  
  
Her smoky siren song is enough to pull him off the boat without even realizing it. One, two, three steps off the edge before he sees Chuck pulling away with a smile and a salute. Before he realizes that the tug of Suicune’s voice lured him onto the waters yet again.  
  
“Heed that feeling underfoot. Know the water wants to obey, if you reason with it gently. And march on through the islands, to assert that serene dominion.”   
  
Eusine takes another few steps, failing to conceal a smile of pure disbelief.   
  
“We will see each other soon, my son, as long as you press on.”  
  
“I will,” he replies, fully believing it in the moment. And then she’s gone, leaving him with the treacherous waters ahead.  
  
Eusine’s march begins auspiciously, waves parting as he approaches them. It’s almost more comfortable to walk on water, the way it conforms to his steps. With the first island in sight, he breaks into a jog, and it just feels  _right_  the way he trods upon the seas.   
  
Only as he stands on the shore of the southwest island does the task ahead dawn on him.  
  
The tempest surrounding Whirl Islands is enough to deter most visitors. Should someone make it as far as Eusine has, nature is determined to ensure that is as far as they get. His north wind is forfeit to Lugia’s seething gales, impossibly blowing every direction at once. Whirlpools are terrifyingly commonplace, whether small enough to leap over or too large to be real. The waves aren’t as tall as on the open water, but they’ve no drop in punch or frequency.  
  
The innards of Whirl Islands look futile. Eusine must be the one to change that.  
  
His first steps off solid land come far more naturally to him this time. After that, each step further from shore is another beat per minute his heart races ahead of him. Every time his feet are splashed, he can see himself falling under. Every time the waves reach his waist, a cold spell ices his spine. Every step he takes is another towards either exalthood, or it’s his last one.  
  
It feels like a half-day hike just to reach the second island.  
  
Eusine knows Lugia must be watching him again. The god’s storm only amplifies, the waves looking ever hungrier as he stares down the next island. The smaller whirlpools are his size, and the bigger ones drill to the core of the earth. A squall from behind knocks him onto all fours, his hands landing atop the water.  
  
He picks himself up once the storm allows him to, and doesn’t hesitate this time before he takes off.   
  
The swells do all they can to take his legs out from under him, attacking from all directions. Eusine tries to stare straight through his dripping bangs, but there’s too much happening for tunnel vision to end well. He darts to his right to avoid a portal to the depths, and is rewarded by a wave aiming for his jugular. His heart beats on his ribs, and Lugia’s response is to send a breaker to crash into it.   
  
The doubts are there still, but muted. A quiet chorus of “you can’t make it from here” echoes, trying to wash over him in time with the waters. He sputters out shattered gasps after each crash he survives. The wind tugs him east, and he ducks west to avoid a crag jutting out at him. The whirlpools grow in number the closer he gets to the island, making him dead-sprint a tightrope to shore.  
  
All Eusine can think is it doesn’t matter if he can’t, just that he must.   
  
The sea breaches right under his step, just yards from safety. His palms fracture the water when they come down, and the surface finally gives way.   
  
His trance shatters, and panic takes over. Arms thrash and legs churn just trying to get to the surface, but the maelstrom yanks him down the second he kicks upward.  
  
It’s a different universe, underwater. Barren. Murky. The dozens of funnels reeling around him give the appearance of an abandoned temple, or a tomb.  
  
Air. He needs air. He needs the air, the wind, doesn’t matter the direction. Just get back up.   
  
He could see the shore before he went under. He was so close to safety, before Lugia’s cheap shot.  
  
Eusine just wants to move. The vortex keeps hold, but he pushes to break the ceiling on which he’d been walking.   
  
A switch flicks behind his eyes. He stops struggling, stops everything but treading underwater.   
  
And the whirlpool’s hold loosens as well.  
  
He shuts his eyes again, halting time, and he gives one last push.  
  
Eusine breaks the surface, taking all the air he can. Taking his life back, just as it was slipping. He catches a glimpse of the island and starts paddling. The storm god relents, sending a wave to carry him to the sands. The second he reaches solid ground again he collapses, every inhale the most grateful one he’s ever had.  
  
And he has one island to go.  
  
It takes a few minutes on the western shore to come down from survival mode, staring down an island he can’t even see. But if he survived a dirty trick from the “guardian” of the seas, then he can damn well go one more round.  
  
His foot plunges through the surface twice before he finds purchase. Once he locks in, he feels a calm seep into his bones.  
  
Eusine only has a moment before he’s pummeled yet again. The whirlpools aren’t as substantial, but the waves are avenging their loss. Gusts shove him at the worst times, making him zigzag across the aquatic minefield. He feels like he’s going sideways more than forward, and then a flurry sends him skidding backward like a sick joke.  
  
He fights through it all, keeping his footing as best he can, keeping all the composure he can muster. His thoughts race with reasons for Suicune to be disappointed in him. Ways his journey could end here. Ways his life could end here. His heart burns and his legs feel scorched and his breathing is irregular at best.   
  
He silences it all with a deadset composure that almost feels foreign.  
  
A wave plows into his side, knocking him onto all fours as the destination nears. With a huff, Eusine crawls until he gets his balance back. By then the final island is within reach, and Lugia has no more tricks to throw at him beyond the surely lethal.   
  
When he sets foot on the shore, he breaks into a survivor’s grin as his legs finally falter. And he tries not to think about the fact that he’ll have to walk back to Chuck’s boat. He might have conquered the water, but he’s all too grateful for land right now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title = "On The Water" by The Walkmen.


	5. Lazuli

The waters are much more forgiving here. Even as they pummel the cliffside beneath him, at least it’s not him being pummeled.

Instead, the thought pummeling him is that maybe, he survived the islands because Lugia bailed him out. Hell, he had to be ushered just into taking baby steps, and that hesitance gnawed at him between every island. He was the same bundle of nerves, even when he needed but a fraction of Suicune’s poise to make it through.

Surely, gods don’t pick potential exalts merely because they like rain or fire. Not when they have hundreds of years to decide on the one who perfectly represents them, and not with the level of stakes that can only come with the works of deities. Suicune pinning everything on Eusine feels as irresponsible as going for a stroll in the Whirl Islands.

The next judgment is soon, too. He’s ventured across the region by this point, with the north wind tailing him nearly every step of the way, and his affinity with Suicune’s element has only grown. His new form of fidgeting is idly spinning a ring of water an inch from his fingertips, and that’s how he’s trying to drown his thoughts now. Instead, all he can think is that he’s the world’s worst pokemon. He can walk on water, bend it to his will, and he has the north wind tailing him at every turn. And yet… he hasn’t done anything. Can’t find the will to. All he’s done is follow a path laid out for him and stumbled through every obstacle. Eusine stands here with all the potential in the world, and yet the sum of it is the same useless feeling that’s pinned him down for years.

“Hey?”

He’s snapped out of his trance with that. Falkner gives him a furrowed brow and overwhelming concern, the kind that makes Eusine feel bad for being anxious.

“I can see why you wanted me around,” Falkner says, managing to put up a sly grin while still being worried. As soon as Eusine got back to Cianwood, he had contacted Falkner about meeting up here in Olivine. He might be the kind that keeps to himself, but the journey to exaltation is a tiring and lonely one. After the stress of the Whirl Islands, he needed someone, any friendly face to keep him grounded. Lugia may not be known for hospitality, but his conduit stuck in Eusine’s mind until he finally bit the bullet.

“Y-yeah…” Eusine replies, brushing a bang off to the side.

Falkner brushes his own shaggy blue hair out of the way as he cranes his neck. They’re in the shadow of the famed lighthouse, with just about no one else around. That privacy is about as welcome as it is unnerving. “Well, you’re here, right?”

“I mean, the lighthouse is quite neat, yes. And I always love bay views like this,” comes the reply, quiet as always.

Falkner laughs. “Yeah yeah, we both love water. But what I’m saying is, you’ve survived, thrived even.”

Eusine feels blood rush to his cheeks, out of embarrassment more than anything else. Way to sound stupid in front of a vessel. “Oh. I… I don’t know about _that_ exac-”

Falkner cuts him off just by breathing in. “Eusine. Lugia’s pretty much my damn dad and I wouldn’t have been able to do what you did at the Whirl Islands. If you can do that, and if you can stay standing through all of these storms, then there’s no doubt in my mind that you’ll be seeing this through to the very end.”

Both of them get lost in the waves coming into shore. Eusine takes a deep breath, then another to let that vote of confidence circulate.

He finally turns to Falkner. “Is Lugia telling you to say that too?” he asks, against his better judgment.

Falkner smirks. “No,” he says, but then his face changes. That smirk grows cruel, just for a fleeting second. His eyes flicker, grow more intense, enough that his stare makes Eusine’s heart stop. With two voices, he continues, “But I agree with my damn son.”

Falkner’s normal smugness returns, and he looks like nothing happened, like a god didn’t just possess him to say one sentence.

To the duo’s credit, the terror it puts Eusine through is enough to make him forget his anxieties. “How often does he do that?” he asks.

Falkner just shrugs. “Depends. Sometimes once a week, and sometimes he takes a whole day or two to himself.”

Eusine’s hands clasp and unclasp in front of him. He shudders to imagine Suicune doing the same with him, completely out of the blue. “And you just… wake up like it never happened? Every time?” he asks.

As he asks, his eyes fall onto a pair of young men, both stubbled with buzz cuts, both a little too shifty-eyed. He generally couldn’t trust his intuition less, yet his gut is jabbing at him the second he spots them, and somehow, he believes it. They’re trying too hard to not have an air about them as they wander around the lighthouse.

Falkner shrugs, oblivious to anyone but Eusine and the god of the seas watching over his every move. “You get used to it. It’s almost an honor, y’know, that a god wants to be you for a little while. Plus, I bet it’s a _great_ party trick. Still need to test it out, though.”

They keep glancing over at him and Falkner. With every look, a certain doom settles deeper into Eusine. They’re going to rob us, he thinks. No, he knows. The last time he was so certain of a future event it all spiraled out of control in the worst way, but for once he’s too caught up in this moment to agonize over that one.

Eusine lets his Haunter out of his capsule, just in case. “Judah,” he hisses, palming the capsule holding Laguna as well.

“Yes, boss?” comes the reply. He almost forgot he can speak with his Haunter now, but hearing his first pokemon’s raspy voice gives him a strange comfort. The sudden unease that Falkner shows takes all that away.

“Be on guard,” is all Eusine says, giving the slightest of gestures ahead of him. The men proudly bear scowls now, abandoning any pretenses of just being tourists. He lets Laguna out as well, and by the grace of Suicune she doesn’t make a grand entrance like usual.

The robbers descend.

Even as time slows, Eusine’s breath accelerates. There’s no turning back now, looking at this showdown. Both of them are eyeing up Falkner in particular, and oh god, one just pulled a knife.

To his dismay, Eusine watches as they each pull out a Pokeball of their own as well. When the lights dissipate and reveal another Haunter and a Sneasel, that dismay morphs into a sinkhole in his stomach.

He turns to Falkner first, scrounging up every ounce of assertiveness he can muster. “Get behind me. Judah, play defense. Laguna, help him with the Haunter first. Both of you, stay alert for the Sneasel.”

To his surprise, Falkner follows his order, with wide eyes. The criminals stand their ground, but both of them have blades shining at Eusine now. He shoves a hand behind his back, sensing not just water forming from the humid air, but the potential for a torrent. The same kind of torrent that comes with any water pokemon, pulling gallons seemingly out of nowhere. It comes to him as merely a click deep in the folds of his mind, and the fact that it feels so natural is what’s alien to him.

The size-up before the fight ends in an instant. Sneasel makes the first move, pouncing on Laguna like she’s a Pidgey egg. She’s surprisingly nimble for her rotund stature, though, rolling out of the way and even grazing her foe with a headbutt in return. The Haunters simply stare each other down, Judah’s good-natured smile replaced by resignation. He was never a fighter, especially against his own kind, but evidently his foe also isn’t as pugilistic as his partner.

Both of the robbers close in on Eusine, aiming to flank him. His hands quiver more the closer they get, when he needs stability more than anything else.

When he fires a pillar of water at the stockier man to his left, though, confidence swells within him. Not enough to enjoy the moment, and surely not enough time to process it, but for what feels like the first time in years, the thought occurs to him that he can genuinely do this.

The other criminal’s bug-eyed look helps. He freezes mere feet from Eusine, who’s holding the sternest gaze of his life. The man double-takes between his partner and this apparent demi-god he’s trying to rob. He clutches his knife tighter, but takes a second to swallow back his apprehension.

Laguna fends off another swipe as she locks the other Haunter into a nasty psychic chokehold. The Sneasel lands and takes off in the same bounce, the kind of agility they’re infamous for. Judah has to slide over just to get in a half-hearted lick.

The second he turns away, though, Laguna’s in trouble again. Her psychic attacks can’t touch the Sneasel, and headbutts don’t matter when she can’t connect.

And one slash is all it takes for her world to start spinning.

Eusine breaks first, darting over to her side. Judah has to concern himself with the weasel, floating high off the ground and showering it in pitch-black beams until it’s dazed enough to fall. The opposing Haunter just looks after his drenched trainer.

The robber still standing turns to Falkner, brandishing his knife. A chill runs down his spine imagining all the worst-case scenarios, but instinct forms ice in Eusine’s palm.

“Hey!” he calls, raising it towards the criminal. Just the threat freezes him on the spot. He stares Eusine down, gritting his teeth. Then he just spits, and makes a break for it.

Laguna’s breathing is labored. Every time she exhales, there’s no guarantee another inhale will follow. Eusine reaches for her pokeball, but he can’t bring himself to call her back. Maybe it’s the fear that she’ll pass inside the capsule, that recalling her now is letting go. Or maybe it’s just the same hesitance that constantly besets him, with at least a day’s worth of heartbeats skipped.

Her eyes flicker, as lazily as ever. Whether they’re full of spunk or on death’s door, Drowzees look just about the same.

Eusine feels like he’s about to stop breathing. Is this, dare he think it, ordained? Must he grip mortality the hard way on his path to exaltation?

Falkner’s next to him now, holding his hand, rubbing the back of it with a thumb. Laguna coughs, a soft little hack of her lungs that could very well be her soul exiting with a whimper.

 _“I know you know I like the beach,"_ she says. _“But you can take me to the infirmary now.”_

…what?

“Y-you sure?” Eusine asks.

 _“Just dazed. Fucking hate Sneasels. But. I’m fine.”_ She beams up at her owner now. _“Sure had you going, though.”_

Judah groans, rubbing his face with one of his hands. Eusine presses his free hand over his nose, taking the longest breath of his life before adjusting his collar and turning to Falkner. “Sorry about this.”

Falkner just laughs, shaking his head. But he squeezes Eusine’s hand, clearing the hopeful exalt’s mind of everything but the young man in front of him.

“No no… thanks for saving me,” he says. He takes Eusine’s other hand now, and he just doesn’t let go of either.

Eusine smiles, words failing him now. But he doesn’t think he wants Falkner to let go.

“You see, though?” Falkner tells him. “You might have had all that anxiety to deal with, but the second everything kicked off, before that even, you kicked their asses.”

Eusine scratches his head, then stops once he realizes he’s messing up hair that’s already mussed. “I don’t… think it was that much, really...”

“You were my knight in shining armor there. I’d say that’s worth something.” Falkner kneads the back of Eusine’s hands as he says it, which only freezes Eusine up more.

He looks at his hands being warmed back up. “You’re overselling me,” he replies.

Falkner loosens up, laughing and flashing a toothy smile. “You’re on the path to becoming an exalt. I don’t think it’s possible to oversell any part of that.”

Eusine can’t quite disagree with that, so he just sits with his hands in Falkner’s and sheepishly matches his smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title comes from a song from a band I can't believe I didn't immediately associate with this run, "Lazuli" by Beach House. A fucking phenomenal and consistent band, and a wonderful song to boot. One of these days I'll prolly make a full playlist for the run, and try to resist just throwing like 4-5 bands' entire discographies in there.


	6. The Tower

Eusine’s face is ashen. He desperately hopes the rest of him doesn’t end up the same.

Visitors to Ecruteak often return home saying that they felt as if they were walking around with a hole in their head. That comes from the few times Ho-oh has appeared to overlook her domain, with a gaze so piercing it lingers for years. And when some brazen creature decides to run afoul of her, they don’t get the chance to beg for mercy.

From what Eusine knows, those who have taken his path tread an even thinner tightrope.

He stumbles into Morty’s modest home like he just finished one of those walks. As soon as he sees the man’s lopsided smile, twitching like the embers of the fireplace behind him, his pounding heart finally wanes. He’s known Morty for a couple years, long enough to know that he’s not nearly as austere as his god, right down to a handshake that’s too soft even for Eusine.

Still, when he’s instructed to close his eyes, he feels his chest knot up. The ominous feeling only gets worse when Morty tacks on, “You’ll know when to open them.”

But Eusine does as he’s told. He tunes into the breeze like he has with Suicune and Lugia before, letting it sway him back and forth, letting it direct his thoughts and hopefully quiet the klaxons that are once again blaring.

While the wind never gets beyond a caress, something else slinks its way in. It begins as a fleeting whiff, almost eliciting a sneeze. As soon as that fades, it becomes an assault. The itch at his nose starts to burn as the feeling gets harsher, fiercer.

Fiery, even.

Eusine knows he should keep his eyes shut as long as possible. He even wants to seal them shut, block out the world, let it revolve right by. But he needs to see what he’s dealing with. At least once he sees, he can-

It’s an inferno. Flames swallowing the whole world in front of him, no, all around him. That smell, suddenly it’s not a pile of firewood, it’s every Typhlosion in Johto starting a riot.

He darts to a window, the one that isn’t blocked by the flames yet, even if the smoke is impairing him too. He’s on the second floor.

The stairs. The stairs, the stairs, the stairs… are still there, for now. Opposite side of the room, though, naturally. Why would Ho-oh give him any leeway in the biggest test yet of his exalthood credentials? He needs to stop expecting anything good. Whirlpools, hurricanes, massive fires, all in the span of weeks. Maybe if he thinks his next confrontation will be a region-splintering earthquake, or fighting a raging Tyranitar with his bare hands, he’ll be pleasantly surprised at the actuality.

For now, he eyes the stairs. The room is shambling, but the encroaching flames haven’t swallowed it whole. He leaps, bounds, sidesteps, and leaps again to make it there, and the second he does, all hell breaks loose behind him. The first step down nearly crumbles underfoot, startling him into leaping to the platform below.

When he sees the rest of those stairs start disintegrating, he feels justified in that reaction.

He still has another half-flight to go, and this time he takes no chances. Half of them in one bound, and the lightest touch he can muster pushes him over the other half.

The fire must have started from above, he thinks, looking over the first floor. There’s light on the other side, from the entrance. No, the exit. It’s a ways away, given that this is the foyer, but he can make it.

A yowl erupts through the cackling flames. Moaning, desperate, the kind you expect to hear in a disaster zone, and the kind that fractures Eusine’s heart.

It came from his left, he thinks. He hopes. This side room maybe. A shrine room, as he peers into it.

At the base of the shrine, where drawings of Ho-oh are blackening at the corners and the incenses burn far too intensely, lie three pokemon.

Three siblings. Jolteon, Vaporeon, Flareon. He doesn’t know which one cried out; they all look worse for wear.

Eusine inspects them all as he shuffles over, with only the Vaporeon eyeing him back. He slides his arms under the Jolteon first, grunting as he lifts it. It’s the only one that doesn’t resist fire, and its big black eyes already look scarily drowsy.

“Don’t you dare fall asleep,” he tells it as he skates back around the fire and out the door. His breath leaves him when he realizes he has a set of stone stairs to descend to get the Jolteon to safety outside, but the adrenaline running his system sees him through.

He takes the stairs two and three at a time back up. Everything is faltering when he steps back inside. He skids around a flame that explodes when a beam plummets and feeds it. More fuel to a fire that needed no help.

The Flareon comes next, a little bigger with stained brown tufts of fur. It wriggles in his arms, as if it wants to bound right out, but he squeezes it and leans into its ear as he begins his second trip. “I got you, just… just stay still for now.”

The path he took to rescue the Jolteon is nearly devoured by the inferno. Still, he takes a sinewy, snaking route through the massive foyer before skidding to a halt inches from the stairs. One step at a time, especially with the smoke and Flareon’s fur obscuring his vision, and then the fire-type is safe, gratefully curling up next to its sibling. The two of them almost shake in unison, but just being safely outside looks to be helping.

Eusine stares down the office building as he collects his breath and his wits. It’s hard to climb the steps when his nose stings from ash and his skin feels like parchment, but it’s better to focus on that than the other things his mind could dig up.

Just to get inside, he’s has to confront the flames head-on. He readies water in his palm, finally remembering that he’s the exalt of [i]Suicune[/i], but only quells them long enough for him to skip through with his face buried in the crook of his elbow. The same goes for the walkway back to the shrine, or what’s left of it.

The Vaporeon is staring through him when he enters. It looks brittle, wilting in the fire. Something about it reminds Eusine of himself. It saps enough adrenaline for him to realize he’s gasping for air with each breath, and getting a poor return.

He still hacks and coughs his way over to the Vaporeon, and takes far too long just to lift it, even with the creature trying to push itself up.  

Both he and the Vaporeon choke out water to clear their path as much as they can, but the fire’s relentless, scorching their skins and daring them to escape their grasp. Another beam falls just a foot behind, jolting Eusine into a full-fledged dash across the room, straight through whatever flames the Vaporeon doesn’t mitigate.

Until a peeling board on the wooden floor catches his foot, and sends both of them tumbling.

The Vaporeon is flung to the exit, while Eusine isn’t so lucky. Something’s bleeding, but he can’t tell where. Something else collapses behind him, enrapturing the flames even more. It’s like they siphon his strength with every inch they grow. He feels himself starting to sink into the floor, fading away.

It petrifies him, the same sleepiness that was plaguing the Jolteon before. The knowledge that one blink becomes eternity. That this journey for ascension would end with an entire building descending upon him. That his quest in Suicune’s footsteps halts in the face of an inferno.

…No.

Eusine doesn’t know where the word comes from. He just hears it barked in his own voice, or something close. A numbness wells up, either resignation or resolve. Whatever it is, it makes the flames jumping him back off. The soot in his lungs seems to dissolve.

And slowly, he rises to his feet.

The Vaporeon is on all fours as well, but it’s a shrub in a tornado until Eusine scoops it up again. Staggering, breathless, but somehow steady, he lurches down every step. In his wake, the rest of the building succumbs.

The second he drops Vaporeon next to its siblings, he begins succumbing to the exhaustion too, gasping for clean air. Light overtakes him, banishing the smoke, banishing his vision, but he still shakes and grunts like he’s about to implode.

He has just enough in him to check on the trio when the light fades, but they’re not huddled together how he left them. They’ve all risen to their feet, and they’ve all grown.

Eusine finds himself on all fours, looking up at the legendary beasts themselves.

He turns around. In place of that mundane office building stands the Burned Tower.

Suicune herself stands at the head of the three, and seems to smile down at him. He feels another pair of eyes from above her, too, boring into him far more sternly than Suicune’s soft gaze.

“You were excellent, Eusine,” she says. “And you have my Mother’s blessing.”

Once again, everything erupts into a blinding blaze. This time he’s returned to Morty, to the true Ecruteak.

“Congrats,” he says, with that distinctive sideways grin. “You’ve passed both gates now.”

Eusine is more relieved than anything, but his posture is a little bit straighter after he catches his breath. “Good to hear… so, um, what now?”

Morty quietly snorts. “Now? You just follow the path that pulls you. You’ll know.”

He nods, looking down at himself, at Morty, through the window and towards the towers.

“I won’t have to deal with any more natural disasters, will I?” he asks.

Morty laughs. “That’s not up to me, sadly.”

That kills Eusine’s posture before he can leave with his head held high.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is "The Tower," from Wye Oak. Shriek is a swirling masterpiece of an album.


	7. Be My World

The Bell Tower hasn’t rung in centuries. The titular bell is tended to weekly by a young monk, with the utmost care to preserve its silence. Countless checks have been made to ensure it can withstand a disaster, unlike its predecessor. Should the unthinkable happen, it would be swarmed like a man who barged into a Beedrills’ nest. For now, it stands strong as one of world’s great monuments.  
  
When it tolls, Eusine feels every vibration in the bell’s past run through him. The pagoda is a beacon of hope and sanctity for the city and the region, yet all he sees is the shadow it casts over him.  
  
He knows he must go.  
  
The monk at the gate regards him with stoicism, halting Eusine in his tracks before he passes. They lock eyes, and neither budges until he gives the slightest of nods. Only then does his heart stop careening around his ribcage.   
  
By the time he reaches the steps to the ground floor, it’s already revved up again.   
  
It’s not the same panic he’s used to, at least. It’s a dull throb rather than a razor’s jab, and it feels odd to him that it’s so subdued. His breathing is steady, his hands don’t shake — it’s just his mind that’s nostalgic for the days of hysterics.  
  
He stops at the top of the stairs. The city beyond looks as peaceful as the warm-colored trees in front of him. If he were at all artistic, he would set up shop here for the next week, slaving away at a canvas until he finishes a masterpiece or he reaches death by a million brush strokes. Likely the latter, given how vast this view is.  
  
“Tranquil, hm?”  
  
Suicune’s beside him. He doesn’t know when she got there, or where she came from. But here she is, taking in the same view rather than taking him to her ethereal realm.  
  
“Yes... strangely so,” he replies, doing his best to keep his gaze straight ahead.  
  
She laughs, a one-note bark. “You must be well-acquainted with peculiarities by now.”  
  
Eusine grips his leg to keep his hand from shaking right off the wrist. When did he start trembling again? Why does she have this power over him? How perverse is this, for him to be so anxious in the face of such calm?  
  
One question bubbles its way above all those, as it has since this all began.  
  
“Why me?”  
  
Against his better judgment, he looks at her now. Her crest gleams in the sun as she slowly turns to him. “Hm?”  
  
“There’s so many people in Johto. So many good, faithful… put-together people in this region, so many just here in Ecruteak who live under the gaze of the towers every day and are so much more worthy of-”  
  
“Eusine.”  
  
His breath evaporates. Suicune’s crimson stare screeches time to a halt in anticipation of her reply. Even the north wind pauses.  
  
When she speaks, it’s with the same smoky voice, and the same tone that marks the utmost consideration of every single word. “I promise you, I will give you the reasoning for my judgment when the time comes. But I cannot do that until you make it through your final task.”  
  
When Eusine moves again, any pretense of calm has faded. “Until I make it through…” he repeats, eyes darting between Suicune and the ground. “Until I make it through… that’s all this has been, you know. Making it through.”  
  
She doesn’t reply. He keeps spiraling.  
  
“That’s all my life has been, is making it through. Making it through school, making it through the bullying, through a horrible job, through all my anxiety, through all my doubts…”  
  
“Eusine, please.”  
  
“And now ‘I’ve been chosen.’ Now my whole life, which is just a series of confrontations between me and myself, is culminating in what? A series of confrontations between me and myself, but now with fire, with hurricanes, with the highest stakes in the world. My entire life has been staggering along purely on nerve, and of all the gods to trot right up to me, it’s the one without a single ounce of that in her body.”  
  
Suicune doesn’t interject now. His hands wind around each other and his legs look almost unfit to hold him up, but she doesn’t utter a word to him.  
  
“You told me on that very first day about my essence? This is it. This is what it’s always been. Anxiety. All the time. Doubts about the past, which color doubts about the future, conspiring to bring down the present.”  
  
He trails off there, more to catch his failing breath than anything else.  
  
“And yet you’re here.”  
  
Eusine blinks, with an empty gaze.   
  
“In spite of all that has plagued you, you stand at the foot of the most sacred place in Johto.”  
  
His little gasps turn back into breaths as he lets that settle in the air. There’s hardly time for that before she continues.  
  
“You have but one task ahead of you. After conquering natural disasters and human foes alike, I have the utmost confidence in you to succeed in that as well.” She lifts her head as her gaze softens. “If you’d like, though, I can provide a little assistance.”  
  
Eusine reels from the offer, almost literally. “Yes, yes, that would be great! I mean, how? You know, not to, not to question you or anything, of course! I just… you know.”  
  
Suicune doesn’t take her eyes off him. “I know?”  
  
Heat swells in Eusine’s cheeks. “Um… I mean, the only other time I’ve seen you is the start. And, now you’re just here. Offering some kind of hands-on… paws-on aid. Or something. However gods work things out.”  
  
Suicune’s mane flows behind her as she circles him. She stops where the conversation started, by his side, overlooking Ecruteak.   
  
“I know. I just have to enjoy you being so easily flustered while I still can,” she says, without any lilt to her voice. “Anyways, shall we begin?”  
  
He whimpers, and then just nods and shuts his eyes when told to.  
  
“We’re going to find your essence, Eusine,” Suicune says, once he’s set. “That place where I summoned you, that was my realm, and you have one too. You just need to tap into it.”  
  
“How so…?”  
  
“Take deep, consistent breaths, in through your nose, then back out through it.”  
  
She pauses, letting him settle into this. “Now, find your peace, however much of it you can. Construct a place where you cannot help but be serene. The feeling you had when walking on water, the poise you worked up in Olivine, they’re what go into this now.”  
  
Eusine squeezes his eyes even further shut, but the moment that weightlessness hits him, they relax again. He looks through his eyelids at his feet, and the stone underfoot melts. Flashes of blue pierce through his vision. The cool he feels when he steadies himself upon the water, it would take him aback if not for that glorious, numbing tranquility that washes over him.   
  
No, he thinks. It’s not numbness, it’s stability. He doesn’t think about the Whirl Islands, he just knows he resides atop the water. He doesn’t worry about the storms he’s weathered, just lets the north wind caress him and buoy him even further.   
  
Eusine smiles to himself, in disbelief more than anything. He’s pawed at it before, toyed with the concept, but only after a quarter of a century does he know what peace is.   
  
Light filters through his eyes until he opens them, and is once again confronted by the aurora borealis monitoring him from above. This one is distinctly purple, but tinged by cerulean. Flecks of seafoam glitter in the sky as well, bringing Suicune’s crest to mind.  
  
He feels pinpricks on his hands. It takes a second to register them as raindrops, but it brings a full-fledged smile to his face as he stretches out both arms. As if he wasn’t cleansed enough, the drizzle hitting him feels as pure as Suicune’s steps.  
  
The goddess herself beams as she trots over next to him, taking in the new sights. “Quite different from mine, I see.”  
  
Eusine has to pause to process his surroundings. There are some similarities, of course. The borealis is near-identical to hers, and both of their realms feature the beach and a vibe that’s stunning in its sheer tranquility. He senses the breezes out at sea swirling, despite the north wind behind him. It takes him back to the moment he came out of his trance in her domain, the gusts twisting and turning until they smacked him across the face.  
  
it was clear skies all around with her, compared to the bright clouds that have accumulated behind him, out of the way of the lights over the horizon. Her seas were frozen, glistening blankets spread over the seabed. His? Ebbing and flowing and breaking onto shore. But the area in which he stands is as placid as can be.  
  
The landscape itself is the biggest shift. The thing that shocked him about Suicune’s realm was the expanse, the endless sea and the eternal shoreline on either side of him. But this…  
  
“It’s… intimate, for sure.”  
  
The ocean sprawls out before him, but behind lies a skinny little cove jutting into the shore. Craggy ridges shelter the bay, while leading up to lush hills. The waters are almost clear as air when they settle, but that’s only deep into the cove.  
  
Suicune looks at him, still taking in everything with awe written all over his face. ”It’s definitely yours.”  
  
Eusine turns to the legendary beast, finally having pried his attention away for a moment.  
  
“It’s you.”  
  
Something in those two words strikes him. And something inside of him works up the voice to say, “It’s me…”  
  
“I found my peace through my realm, so many years ago. It’s about time you were able to do the same, my son.”  
  
Everything rattles, falters, distorts around them. The water hardens and grows more opaque by the second. Trees sprout from the hillsides, and the northern wind dismisses both the clouds and the lights.  
  
The entire world creaks and jitters, and Eusine leaps dimensions without moving an inch. Before he can grasp at his realm any more, he’s in front of the Bell Tower, with Suicune by his side.  
  
Not all of the peace of that moment carried over. The nerves of this world have him shaking again, ever so slightly. His mind races just trying to comprehend as much as he can about the past few minutes.   
  
And yet, not all of the peace has dissipated.   
  
More importantly, much of the anxiety has.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Be My World" by You Can't Win, Charlie Brown. v good writing music tbh.


	8. Comfy In Nautica

By this point, Eusine should be used to storms.  
  
Rain pelts his hood as he trudges north, chin and shoulders tucked into himself. He’s freed from thoughts of becoming fish feed by a different lament, that he can’t even enjoy the rain when it’s this harsh. That’s the Lake of Rage, though — a living, breathing quandary in the north of Johto. Everyone wonders which was fuming first, the Gyarados or the weather. Even Lugia shrugs off the question.  
  
He lifts his head to glance at the man escorting him. Eusine’s faint stress wrinkles might be fading, but Pryce’s stern visage has been locked into place for decades now. His gaze has been set forward the whole trek too, not once regarding him since they first met. Considering how cutting that one look was, Eusine is content with that.  
  
The lake itself jumps out at him. There’s no clearing, no shore, just endless forests with this woodland oasis as a burial ground for the trees sunk by a massive storm centuries ago. With how bad this tempest is, Eusine half-expects it to expand today.  
  
“There,” Pryce says, pointing ahead. A pack of Gyarados writhe around the lake, occasionally diving under only to emerge with a roar to rally its comrades. This is how the lake was born. This is how Eusine’s quest ends.   
  
He studies them as he wanders onto the lake’s surface. It’s almost pure chaos… but there’s a central figure. Even through the storm he can see the crimson Gyarados who’s the eye of it all. It’s as much a symbol of Johto as Ho-oh and Lugia, an emblem of the untamed side of a region averse to change.  
  
Lightning cracks and stabs the water as the serpents dance around with furious grace. With every step Eusine takes, the water underneath cracks as well, crystalizing underfoot. He glides across, inexorably pulled towards the center as his heart rate slows.  
  
Everything slows. The waves cease crashing, as if they saw what he did at Whirl Islands and want no part of him. The Gyarados’ thrashes become a tango, a piece of silent theater with the rain applauding every move, every spin. He watches the next bolt come down, warping and threatening but never truly leaving a mark. It just scars the sky until the next one takes its shot at the lake.    
  
He releases Judah with a delicate flick and another flash. All he says is to “wear them down.” The Gengar knows exactly what that means, dissipating into his own little rift he’s carved into the planes. Ahead, the Gyarados, ever restless, take their revenge on a lake that only ever treated them like the fickle royalty they are.   
  
Crimson sinks into one pair of eyes, and that slow-motion thrashing settles into slumber. That break lasts for all of seconds before another one rears back and slaps it like a boxer in the ring.  
  
And then another falls to sleep, and the cycle repeats.   
  
Eusine stands at the precipice of this rage, calmer than he’s ever been. The nerves he feels are merely a buzz keeping him from doing anything rash. They swim under the surface, barely tangible and ultimately meaningless. He stifles a laugh to himself out of sheer disbelief.   
  
Judah dutifully returns once he’s worn down each Gyarados, at least enough that their writhing doesn’t have the same livid energy as before. Beneath them, the whole lake has stilled. They seem to rise through a glass floor despite their thrashing. The waters reflect a nonexistent sun, ever more radiant as Eusine approaches them now.  
  
“I believe that’s enough for now,” he says, in a voice not quite his own. It has too much weight, too much power, too little vibrato. It attracts all the Gyarados, looking down on him with vermilion eyes and agitated expressions. But it brings all of them to a halt.  
  
Eusine keeps his stare trained on the red one, the ringleader. Staring down the leader stares down the pack, he thinks.   
  
“Let us not mistreat the lake you call home,” he tells them. “That storm of yours cannot create any more, just destroy what you already have.”  
  
Judah appears by his side again, with a somber expression. He holds a single Magikarp, blackened and static, and raises it for the serpents to see.  
  
Eusine glances at it, adopting the same look of gloom. “See? One of your own, departed too soon. So many cycles involve death, but not needless ones like this. Let’s just enjoy the waters we have been blessed with.”  
  
The glow rises. The iridescent lake beams up at his subjects, a borealis beneath Eusine rather than above. He turns his palms to the sky, beckoning them to his cause, pleading for peace from the peaceless. All four Gyarados stay transfixed on him, lost in thought, lost in consideration of a message completely novel to them. Ceasefire for those eternally at war is akin to running for those blessed with flight.  
  
But one by one, they dive beneath the crystal sea, without so much as a single grunt, taking the storm with them.  
  
Eusine feels the adrenaline fade with each step back to the shore, replaced by an impossible sense of relief. Here he is, at the Lake of Rage, and he has taken the rage right out of it. The untamed red Gyarados was tamed. The symbol of Johto’s ferocity dove without a sound.  
  
And he, the bundle of nerves, did not flinch.  
  
The moment he reaches land again, Pryce nods, the only recognition he’s received the whole day. Beside him, Judah grins, the most earnest smile possible of a Gengar.  
  
And behind him, a familiar voice.  
  
“You look quite serene.”  
  
Eusine turns, and there Suicune stands. As majestic as always, and prouder than he can possibly know.  
  
“Hah… I-I feel quite serene,” he breathes, not believing it still.   
  
“Come, Eusine,” she says, smiling as much as a goddess can. “Exaltation awaits.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title = "Comfy In Nautica" by Panda Bear.


	9. Crystalised

Her realm is just as he remembers. An eternal horizon sprawls out before him, while the sea itself brings him back to that strikingly serene moment at the Lake of Rage. The shore where this all began for him is perfectly sculpted, flat by the ocean while rolling dunes shelter it from the rest of the world.

Under the aurora borealis, he feels at home. That’s the one difference now.

Back then, he was paralyzed. Doubts plagued him, trying to poison his memory of such a stunning domain, but that was the one thing he never let them touch. No matter what happened to him, Eusine never let his doubts drag his image of Suicune down. She was perfect in her elegance, and her realm was the one place that could never be tainted.

The two of them stand upon her waters now as kin, mother and son, god and exalt. 

Eusine takes it in with a disbelieving grin, just as he has every day he’s spent here in the past two weeks. His realm may have its differences, but honestly, he wouldn’t have minded if it was a carbon copy of this.

“You’ll have to enjoy this view while it lasts,” she tells him. “Raikou’s chosen one finished his test today. Exaltation is right around the corner.”

His smile fades, and those long-waning nerves materialize for the first time in days. He sees the way his hand shakes, and a frown crosses his face.

“I… can’t be ready like this, can I?” he asks, fixated on his trembles. With everything else so still around him, it only makes his quakes worse.

“Eusine, you have been ready.” She says it so matter-of-factly that it doesn’t help.

“I’m still anxious, though. Even now, I don’t nearly have your poise.” He tries to take a deep breath, then another. It mitigates the shakes, at least.

Suicune trods right up next to him, her violet mane flowing so effortlessly behind her. He looks over at her, and the one question he’s had since the beginning bubbles to the surface again. She looks over at him, expectantly. Of course she knows what’s on his mind. When hasn’t she?

Eusine turns his gaze back out to sea, with another sharp intake. Finally, it comes out in merely a whisper.

“Why me?”

Suicune smiles.

“Of all the people in Johto, why am I here?”

Suicune matches his look over the horizon, but when she turns to face him, she brings his gaze back to her. “You have trod upon the Whirl Island seas. You have stood upright in the fiercest storms, and you have shown the valor that makes me who I am. To do that while fighting off demons every step of the way, my son, that is true strength.”

Eusine is silent, letting it sink in. She allows him that moment before proceeding.

“Some exalts are chosen because they match perfectly. My brother, Entei? I swear he finds the most fiery soul in Johto, gives them one test, and that’s that. I expect nothing less from him, of course.” She gives a wolfish grin. “But I believe exalts require growth, and that the truest exalts are the ones that have to claw their way up.”

Eusine’s cape flutters in the north wind. He fusses with his hair, that one bang always just barely out of place. 

“Have you ever met someone who’s just effortlessly confident? Besides me, of course.” The smoky chuckle she gives is one he could listen to for the rest of his life. “They have that preternatural composure from the moment they enter this world, but because it is so inherent to them, they cannot explain it. It just is.

“And then there is you. Anxious as a Cyndaquil, yet with the grit and the fire to fight off those demons. With each step, your confidence grows, and those nerves fade a little, whether you realize it or not. Halfway through, you feel exponentially better, just compared to where you were. Down the home stretch, you feel nearly unstoppable because of what’s behind you.”

Suicune gives him the same look she did after the Gyarados, that of the world’s proudest mother. “And by the end, Eusine, you are the most poised man in Johto, because you know better than anyone what composure is, because you know what lack of composure is too. More than anyone else in Johto, you know how to overcome your fears.”

He stares out at the horizon, tinged with the palette of the northern lights above. He’s stopped messing with his hair, stopped fidgeting at all now. “Yes… I suppose I do.” 

She beams at him. “Would you like to become the purest now, as well?” 

He finally cracks a smile again, but this one, more than any in his life, shows confidence. “Of course.” 

Eusine’s ivory shoes disintegrate, leaving his bare feet atop the sea. Already, he feels them pulse with an unfamiliar energy, but it’s one that feels all too right.

“Purification of the water is purification of your soul,” she tells him. “It’s about expelling negativity.”

“You feel negativity?” he asks. Only after it comes out does he think how stupid it might sound. If it is, Suicune doesn’t give any tells. 

“Sometimes my siblings can be… rash. Sometimes humans can be as well. I wouldn’t be a god if I didn’t look down on others every now and again.” The sly smile she gives almost makes him feel light-headed.

Eusine rights himself as he slows his breathing, in and out through his nose. When he shuts his eyes, sparks crackle through his system. He remains on the water, but he feels like he’s levitating once more.

“We’ll start easy. Go back a few minutes, to those fears of being unready.”

His breath stutters as he dredges up the anxiety. This may be the first time he’s ever willingly brought it to the surface. He fights the urge to drum his fingers against his legs.

The goddess’ smoky voice drowns out his deafening quaver. “That voice in your head will do whatever it can to make you entertain those fears. By now, you know you’re above it.”

“I’m above it,” Eusine tells himself, willing himself to believe. His eyes rest easy, but he’s never felt more conscious of himself.

“Good… on my count, those shakes will be in the past with the rest of those anxieties. You are here, my son, and you are ready. Okay?”

The slight nod she gets from him is all the confirmation she needs.

“One…” she instructs, as his breaths slow. 

“Two, and inhale deep…” she says, as the flood of oxygen sends pinpricks through his head.

“Three, and feel it all ousted from your system.”

Eusine exhales, and out with the air comes the anxiety. He stands statuesque upon the sea, but that stillness brings comfort. 

“Take heed of the clarity you feel. Inhale, and bring it down from your mind. Let it reach your heart, and exhale.”

He feels light, buoyed, but he’s never been more focused as he imagines that clarity dripping down, pooling in his chest for a moment. More than that, he feels as crystalline and pure as Suicune’s crest.

“Inhale, and let it sink further… below your waist… to your knees, and exhale.”

It trickles down, glistening like the sea below him on a flawless day. 

“To your feet, my son… and bestow it upon the ocean. Let your clarity bless the water you hold so dear.”

The sea flares to life, rippling and radiating and bending to accommodate Eusine’s gift. He hardly feels it, but what he does register swells within him. He had given the ocean purity, and the ocean reciprocated.

Eusine opens his eyes, and his irises flash crimson. 

“How does that feel?” Suicune asks, as if she doesn’t already know.

“Wonderful,” he replies. If he wasn’t so impossibly composed, he would be sporting the same dumbfounded smile as his first encounter. “Like… nothing I can even begin to describe.”

“And how do you feel?” she continues. Her violet mane bounces softly in the north wind, while her exalt’s own groomed hair merely flickers. He feels like it’s the most he’ll ever bristle again.

Eusine smiles. He can very easily describe this. 

“Ready.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Crystalised" by The xx.


	10. Live Forever

Every picture Eusine has seen of the Burned Tower is the same, no matter the angle. Charred all around, patches of it punched clean out, the entirety exposed to the harsh elements Johto can bring. When it peered over his shoulder on his way to see Morty, it looked even less steady in person, like a cruel breeze could send it toppling for good. While its cousin to the east looked over the present, this tower seemed to be frozen in time.  
  
Now, with the stone exterior restored and the rotting debris cleared, it almost looks wrong. For the Burned Tower to look... clean? It’s the only thing that gives Eusine pause, enough that he halts at the foot of its crumbling steps.   
  
Months ago, it hardly took more than a leer for him to stop in his tracks. The thought of an actual test arrested him and sent his breathing into fits. He still doesn’t know how he weathered the very first storms. A pang cuts into him just recalling the stitch in his chest he had for days after Lugia’s first test. His legs ache thinking about the moment he collapsed onto the fourth and final Whirl Island. His lungs burn and sputter when visions of that inferno here in Ecruteak fog up his vision. After all these obstacles, it took days of decompression, and most of them only subsided because a new one started looming over him.  
  
One deep breath is all it takes for him to hurdle those nerves now.  
  
Everyone is there when he makes his way inside. Ho-oh is perched on the second floor, with Morty squatting between her talons, but he saw her from his approach. Hard to miss the phoenix, in all her radiance. Maybe that was what made him stop after all.  
  
Lugia won’t arrive until later, but Falkner is with Morty, and Eusine shyly returns both his wave and his broad smile.   
  
Suicune gives him the same proud look he’s received a hundred times, but this one hits him the hardest of all of them. Hard enough that he almost forgets to nod back to Entei and Raikou flanking her, and hard enough that he nearly trips down the stairs to the basement, where two others are awaiting him. He doesn’t recognize either of them, but it’s not hard to tell who’s who. The young woman impatiently tapping her foot as he approaches, with shaggy brown hair and the sharpest stare in the city, must be Entei’s exalt. He veers closer to Raikou’s, a middle-aged man who pulls his four-eyed gaze away from Eusine as he digs his nails into his palms.   
  
Clearly, he thinks, they didn’t go through the same training.  
  
 _“Congratulations to the three of you,”_  a hoarse voice rings out, startlingly clear inside Eusine’s head.  _“It is never an easy road to exaltation, my children, as two of you have no doubt found out. Entei, I do hope that one of these revolutions, you will finally produce a gauntlet of your siblings’ caliber.”_  
  
The only response to Ho-oh comes in the form of two scoffs, one from above and one across the room.  
  
 _“Regardless, all three of you have proven ready for today, and more than ready for all that lies beyond. If there is anything else that anyone here must do or say, speak now before the rites commence.”_  
  
The phoenix’s echo dies down, and silence reigns. Eusine looks at his counterparts; neither of them seem to want anything more than to get this over with, for different reasons.  
  
“See you on the other side!” Falkner chirps.   
  
Eusine can’t help but grin, as inappropriate as it feels. “You too,” he replies, as if Falkner was down here, about to go through the same ritual.  
  
 _“Okay,”_  Ho-oh says after a beat. The air shifts. The uneasiness of Raikou’s exalt feels far more apt.  _“My son, if you would begin this for us? Morty, Falkner, positions.”_  
  
The sky hisses as clouds begin to accumulate, but nothing prepares him for the crack of a bolt striking the tower. Wood topples from the first floor, sending Eusine backpedaling away, but what matters more are the licks of flames overhead.  
  
 _“Find a corner,”_  Raikou calls, sending all three exalts scattering from the hole between floors. Lightning strikes before they even reach them, right where Eusine was standing. The bolt imprints itself in his vision, remarkably straight. The heat from the strike is quickly supplanted by a harsher burn.  
  
Fires on both floors immediately cloud Eusine’s vision with layers of grey. He wipes his brow, taking slow breaths to counter his heart beating on his ribs. Through the smoke, he can see Entei’s exalt staring at the fire, almost unsure what to make of it as it creeps ever outward.   
  
Every instinct of Eusine’s tells him to run, to do what he did the last time he was here and grab the others and escape. All the training on composure in the world couldn’t prepare him to stand in an inferno.  
  
Somehow, he holds his ground as sacred fire rains down from above, Ho-oh and Entei uniting to spew golden flames all around. They engulf the walls, forcing him away from the corner. His nose sears, while he and Raikou’s exalt descend into coughing fits. A flare leaps out and brands his arm, but rather than pain, all he feels is a prick at most.  
  
His lungs don’t do away with the smoke, and that burning stench doesn’t abate. But he looks up at where Suicune would be through the blaze, shuts his eyes, and lets the flames devour him.  
  
On first contact, Suicune alone bound him in paralyzing awe, and now he weaves himself a fiery cocoon with ease. He lifts his chin, seeing her clear as crystal. It buoys him, like the fire sweeps under his feet and lifts him to her level. She’s impossibly untarnished even as the inferno consumes her too. The blaze might be whipping everything around, but her flawless mane sways in her own breeze. It sweeps through his own carefully groomed hair too, penetrating him.   
  
No. He feels himself fading, but he knows the wind isn’t carrying him away.  
  
He  _is_  the north wind.  
  
He feels raw, utterly exposed. This was what it was like hundreds of years ago, the last time this tower caught aflame. That thought keeps him grounded, even as the fire consumes him. It’s bizarre for his journey to culminate in pangs and oblivion, but for it to culminate, it must be ending. This is anything but.  
  
A chill ignites his world. Seafoam washes over him. A fuchsia river cuts through the darkness next. The whole galaxy splays out behind that ever-familiar curtain of light, the borealis that never fails to calm him. Any bitter feeling coming from the sacred fires fades as humidity sets in.   
  
With it comes weight. For a moment he was untethered, and now the comedown begins. The aurora doesn’t fade, and not just because it too is a part of him. It yawns, and from the sky, the rest of his realm is borne.   
  
The first time Eusine saw this beach, he was too shocked at its mere existence to process it. This craggy little nook in the sea, with water bluer than Suicune’s coat and rocky ridges begetting a lush landscape, it was familiar but uncanny. Now, it’s home. The bright clouds above him, the softly ebbing tide, the overwhelming tranquility of this most intimate corner of the world, it’s all perfectly in place, and it’s all his.  
  
It’s all him.  
  
Eusine feels heavier, and the domain rattles. The ridges glisten under the sun, and the seas bleed onto them. Everything glows, and another chill strikes him. The rocks’ sandy hue turns turquoise, crystalizing before him. The water underfoot follows suit, giving him solid ground.   
  
The sky hardens. Just as it bestowed the realm, so too is the sky confiscating it, sending cracks snaking all the way down the crystal wall before him.  
  
The world shatters. Blue becomes black, and black becomes brown.  
  
A roar belts out, melding with a shriek from above, and it’s not a second later that the heavens open up.  
  
Ho-oh peers down at her newest creation as Eusine comes to with a heavy head. One word is in mind, gazing back up at the phoenix:  _Mother._  
  
On either side, Entei and Raikou are coming to while the last vestiges of the inferno die down. Something hundreds of years in the making, now over in an instant.   
  
Claws dig into the scorched wood, extending from turquoise paws. Sheer power coils in these new limbs, waiting to be unleashed in either a gale-producing sprint or yet another purification.   
  
The proof is right there, but it needs to be said to be believed.  
  
“I am Suicune…” she says, making sure it feels right coming out of her mouth. That smoky accent is still there, but it’s just her voice now. That heavy head is just her crystal crest, with her new mane sprouting from behind it. As nice as her hair was just minutes ago, it hardly even compares.  
  
She pictures herself entering here.  _Eusine._  The name brings familiarity, yet the distance of a long-past phase in life. So too does that woeful, bipedal form… but so too does all the anxiety that even her human past had overcome.   
  
Amidst the pangs of nostalgia and the peculiarities of her transformation, Suicune smiles to herself. Just as she was helped and molded by her mother, so too will she be able to choose some restless soul to shape, a son or daughter to mentor. It’s that which keeps Eusine alive, even when the name is dead and the body is lost to the planes. Eusine is the spirit of whoever her exalt shall be, centuries down the road. Eusine is who brought her here. Eusine is still who she is, in a sense. But  _Suicune_ … Suicune is who she was chosen to be.   
  
As her siblings take time to inspect themselves, she locks onto something else. Up in the rafters, in front of the Lugia that helped her call these rains, stands Falkner. He looks down on her with a faint smile, and gives the same wave he did before she was reborn.   
  
Without thinking, Suicune leaps, bounds, and sticks her landing just feet from him. He stumbles back, eyes wide, while she just laughs. Once he regains his composure, though, that sly little grin of his returns.  
  
“Look at you,” he says, as impressed as he is awed. “And it all began with just doubts and fears.”  
  
Suicune shuts her eyes, feeling the north wind caress her as it always will. Her crest beams in the sun that’s once again graced Ecruteak, as if to honor Ho-oh’s newest children.  
  
She beams at Falkner.  _“It always does, doesn’t it?”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Live Forever" by Oasis.
> 
> Thanks for reading, yall! This was super experimental for me in a lot of ways, so just making it through was wonderful. Hopefully you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, and hopefully it wasn't nearly as stressful lmao


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